Sometimes I become overwhelmed at the state of the world and all its tragedies and ruin. Today has been one such day. I have been filled with such heaviness of heart today, despair looming close and near, and so I practically crawled to the noonday eucharist at my church. I needed to be reminded of the hope that we have in Christ.

There, we were reminded of the feast day of the conversion of St. Paul — a man who persecuted the early Christians tirelessly, dragging them before authorities and overseeing their deaths in the name of religious fervor and zeal.

And yet, one day, he was converted in an instant to Christianity. As he writes in his letter to the Galatian church:

“God, who had set me apart before I was born and called me through his grace, was pleased to reveal his Son to me … “

— Galatians 1:15-16

The story of St. Paul’s conversion brought me a much-needed reminder of hope today.

Most especially, it reminded me that God is the one who calls us and is pleased to reveal his son to us at just the right time. He knows when it is time for each one of us to encounter the risen Christ in a way that will change us forever.

And so my prayer today — for you, for me, and for all of this big wide world — is that God would indeed call us to himself through his grace and be pleased to reveal his son, the Christ, Jesus, to each one of us.